Why George Lucas didn’t want Harrison Ford in ‘Star Wars’
In 1977, George Lucas established himself as a leading figure in the New Hollywood wave with the first movie of his magnum opus, Star Wars. A New Hope was an instant worldwide classic, ushering in a golden age for sci-fi cinema. Although this would mark his rise to global stardom, Lucas had become a notable cinematic presence in the early 1970s after co-founding American Zoetrope with his fellow filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola and releasing his early career milestones, THX 1138 and American Graffiti.
American Graffiti, released in 1973, was a seminal drama that marked Lucas’ first collaboration with aspiring actor Harrison Ford. While Lucas hadn’t considered writing a movie of this nature, Coppola, who stood in as producer, asked him to test his auteur skills with a coming-of-age movie.
Given Coppola’s recent success screenwriting for Patton and directing the first instalment of what would become his Godfather trilogy, Lucas was in no position to dismiss the advice. Lucas duly developed the script from an old half-baked idea from his teen years and set about finding a suitable cast.
Joining Ford on the cast for American Graffiti were Richard Dreyfuss, Ron Howard and Paul Le Mat. At the time, Ford was focussing on a career in carpentry but held out mild hopes for his acting exploits. Lucas’ casting agent, Fred Roos, encountered difficulty when the actor said he’d only sign up on the condition he wasn’t forced to have a haircut. In the script, Ford’s character, Bob Falfa, donned a flattop, but fortunately, a compromise was reached in a trusty Stetson hat.
Following the commercially disappointing THX 1138, the movie’s success gave Lucas the confidence to persevere with his new production company, Lucasfilm, and begin work on his next screenplay, Star Wars. Inspired by earlier sci-fi movies like Flash Gordon and The Planet of the Apes, Lucas started to develop his characters.
One of the first central characters conjured for A New Hope was Han Solo, an arrogant and impulsive man who ultimately becomes a hero. Despite their successful collaboration on American Graffiti, Lucas didn’t have Ford in mind for the role initially.
“I had already done American Graffiti with George Lucas,” Ford recalled in a 2020 conversation with Vanity Fair. “George Lucas made it known that he was not interested in working with anybody that he’d worked with in American Graffiti, that he was looking for new faces.”
Lucas instead asked Ford to assist in the casting process for A New Hope by reading lines with prospective candidates and explaining the Star Wars plot. However, Ford’s talent and impressive grasp of the script eventually won Lucas over, and he was cast ahead of other candidates, including Jack Nicholson, Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken and Kurt Russell.
Several years later, when he and Steven Spielberg were looking for a leading man for Indiana Jones, Lucas was once again hesitant to cast Ford. “I was wary of Harrison and I becoming like Scorsese and De Niro,” he told Empire. “I thought, ‘Let’s create a new icon.'”
Consequently, Lucas and Spielberg cast Tom Selleck as Indiana Jones. “We found Tom Selleck, but as soon as the network heard, his option on Magnum P.I. got picked up.” With Selleck off the table, Lucas and Spielberg resorted to their trusty friend, Ford.
Responding to rumours that he had turned down Indiana Jones in a 2020 interview with Rachel Ray, Selleck said: “I didn’t turn it down! I earned the part. I did a screen test. And Steven Spielberg and George Lucas said, ‘You’ve got the part.’ And I said, ‘Well, I’ve done this pilot. I don’t know whether it’s a conflict. … It was Magnum. CBS basically said, ‘No, you can’t do both… But Harrison kind of did a good job.”
Watch the trailer for Star Wars: A New Hope below.
